During the 1800s, the birth of the processed food industry in North America also ushered in the age of food additives. Preservative chemicals saw heavy use in the new tinned food industry, as a means of preventing spoilage. Some preservation techniques discolored the products being packaged, so colorant additives soon came into widespread use. Chemicals previously employed in textile and chemical coloring where pressed into service with little or no human testing. At the dawn of the Twentieth century, a revolution in chemistry saw the bulk of food colorants being refined from petroleum and coal. Aniline, a chemical that is toxic in its unrefined form, was refined from bituminous coal and used extensively in the creation of the "coal-tar" family of colorants. Natural colorants, derived from plant, animal and mineral sources declined in popularity against these new chemical wonders, as they overcame the limitations inherent in their competitors: they could be used in very small amounts, they added no unwanted flavors and they could be made for a fraction of the cost.

This was still not absolute proof, but the sociological pressure to keep the ban in place remained. The FDA has since revised the wording of the ban to reflect the lack of overwhelming proof to note that the color cannot be proven definitely safe or nontoxic.

The effects of the ban where immediate and profound. People began to question exactly what the chemicals listed on food products actually were. A trend toward 'all-natural' foods, combined with a new awareness of how foods where being processed lead to manufacturers limiting the amount of additives they used in manufacturing. Preservative chemicals long assumed safe were reexamined. Some companies even reduced or halted marketing of red colored products after the ban, as consumers assumed they were unsafe.

It should be noted that this lack of definite proof has lead other countries to allow the use of the dye. The United Kingdom, Canada and a majority of the EU allow its use in products today. The stigma attached to the Red Dye #2 remains a uniquely American phenomenon. The ban also leads some food manufacturers to not ship their products to the US. The replacement for Red Dye #2 in the United States is FD&C Red #40, and it has become the most widely used colorant in food products worldwide, largely filling the niche left by its mysterious cousin.